Dr Newlands works in the emergency department at Dumfries and Galloway Royal Infirmary.
And she has many years of experience in humanitarian emergency response and recently spent two months in Ukraine with medical aid charity UK-Med, treating victims of the war. They nominated her for the award.
Dr Newlands said: “I went to Ukraine twice. The first time was in early March, mostly doing health needs assessments, finding out what UK-Med could do in the way of medical and surgical treatment for displaced persons. The Ukrainian medics were treating the injured in war areas, so we were backfilling for them, providing primary health care and treating the chronically unwell. We sent out a tented field hospital to a village near the eastern border where the hospital had been bombed.
“It was very humbling to see these people who had been devastated, lost homes and families, and moved all the way across this huge country for safety.
“A lot of what I was doing wasn’t medicine, it was providing hugs and support – more as a person than as a doctor, and as a symbol that the rest of the world was there.”
The award presentation was made in September by His Majesty the King, in what was his last public engagement before the sad death of Her Majesty the Queen. It will be shown as part of the ‘Who Cares Wins’ on Channel 4 on Sunday.
Congratulating her, NHS chief executive Jeff Ace said: “Anyone who knows and has worked with Freda in any capacity knows her passion and expertise in emergency humanitarian medicine helping those in need as a doctor.
“Freda deserves every recognition that this award brings, and on behalf of NHS Dumfries and Galloway, we are immensely proud of her achievement.”
